George Brandis (Queensland, Liberal Party, Attorney-General) Share this | Hansard source

With respect, let us take one thing at a time and let us not confuse two issues. I just said to you that in Australia our public administration and our politics—certainly at a federal level—have been remarkably free of corruption. There have very seldom been instances of either corrupt members of federal parliament or corrupt public servants. There have been one or two—very rare indeed. However, the same cannot be said of the building industry. That is why, by the way, one of the reasons we set up the Heydon royal commission is that there was an enormous volume of evidence that a culture of corruption across the trade union movement—not affecting all trade unions, I hasten to add, but affecting many—was endemic and widespread, and that is exactly what the royal commissioner found on the basis of uncontroverted evidence, admissions and confessions.